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siliconbits writes "A confidential, seven-page Google Inc. 'vision statement' shows the information-age giant in a deep round of soul-searching over a basic question: How far should it go in profiting from its crown jewels—the vast trove of data it possesses about people's activities? Should it tap more of what it knows about Gmail users? Should it build a vast 'trading platform' for buying and selling Web data? Should it let people pay to not see any ads at all?"

How evil are the shareholders? Will google become evil over the apparent need to make a few extra billion every year? Why is it not okay just to coast along when you're on a good thing already? How much money is enough?

What shall we use to fill the empty spacesWhere waves of hunger roar?Shall we set out across the sea of facesIn search of more and more applause?

Shall we buy a new guitar?Shall we drive a more powerful car?Shall we work straight through the night?

Shall we get into fights?Leave the lights on?Drop bombs?Do tours of the east?contract diseases?Bury bones?Break up homes?Send flowers by phone?Take to drink?Go to shrinks?Give up meat?Rarely sleep?Keep people as pets?Train dogs?Race rats?Fill the attic with cash?Bury treasure?Store up leisure?But never relax at all

Hit the nail right on it's head. Google is a company, which is owned by its shareholders who solely want profit. Google is currently the most valuable brand in the world. By engaging in activities like selling users information, brand value will decline and so will profits (long term). However, not selling the information (short term) will make shareholders angry.

The problem is that Google is a company, which is an anonymous entity in society solely created for the purpose of generating profit. If they chan

If all the employees owned the company, then it'd be a cooperative and exist solely for their own benefit. And who's to say that Google employees wouldn't turn out to be just as evil without the direction from outside shareholders? Likely, they'd also turn out to be a bunch of greedy meatbags.

Google has two classes of shares: A and B.A are only worth 1 vote, B are worth 10.A are all publicly traded, B are all hold by founders, directors and executives.At least in 2007, 67% of the votes were owned by Eric Schmidt, Larry Page and Sergey Brin.

So being publicly available does not mean they don't control the company anymore.

If other shareholders file a lawsuit and win, the situation might change. But right now they do control the company, regardless of being a publicly traded company and having a minority in shares, and this probably won't change as long as Google continues to raise their profits and reduce their operating expenses as they have been doing year after year [wired.com].

That "people" == customers. So you've said it yourself- it's about customers. Regardless of motivation, regardless of consequences.

The site you quoted is stupid, confusing "brand" [brandirectory.com] with "brand value" [brandchannel.com]. Brand, as in "brand loyalty", is about customers tending to purchase specific products or from specific companies, and has absolutely nothing to do with that company's bottom line. What that brand is worth, while the impetus for improvin

3 Aug 2010 - P-6552/2010Question for written answer to the Council under Rule 117MEP Stavros Lambrinidis (S&D)

Council recommendations for combating ‘radicalisation’ in the EU

The conclusions adopted at the Council meeting of 26 April recommend, asa means of combating ‘radicalisation’ within the EU, a mechanism for thecollection of personal data for the purposes of political, religious andpsychological profiling in order to assess the likelihood of recruitmentby terrorist organisa

In traditional sense, shares of a company XYZ were meant to buy you, well exactly, "shares" of the company. Company made X amount of dollars, you got to share profits in accordance with what you own in that company. Company grew, the shares were worth more, however the idea was you got to share the profit. Sure you could sell your shares, however the concept got turned head over heals when shares themselves became trading commodities, so unless prices of shares rise, they are not valued, it does not matter if company is making a fixed X amount of profit year over year.

How many yachts can you surf behind, indeed. Problem is, the REAL mission of any public company is to make profits for its share holders and if such a concern doesn't show healthy and consistent growth every quarter the stock is considered "not great", or at least not as good as it could be, so companies are always looking to grow. Being a money maker, but a stagnant one, is almost as bad as being a cash burner.

Why is it not okay just to coast along when you're on a good thing already?

I think it's drilled into students in business school (if not earlier) that perpetual growth is the only reasonable goal.

A few years ago, I had an opportunity to tag along with a graduate business school trip to Japan (a parent was the faculty chaperon for the trip.) On the trip, we met a diverse selection of Japanese CEOs and executives. One of the most interesting to me was the head of a Sake brewer who was running the business that had been in his family since the early 1600s. It wasn't really his respon

Google had the good vs evil scale when considering whether or not they should pull out of China. There is no doubt in my mind they have some sort of good vs evil or profit vs privacy scale on some executive's dashboard.

My thoughts exactly, although Google would probably make quite a bit of money selling no-advertisements, if only because the majority of people are just not familiar with ad blocking. Reminds me of the various "remote desktop" packages that charge people for what is essentially a rebranded VNC.

All that they need to do on Google's pages is to move away from graphics and iFrames and on to embedded text. I could put adverts on my site very easily that AdBlock+ couldn't catch because there would be no easy way to distinguish it from text. On Google's own pages, it wouldn't make a difference about counting views etc, because they're already capturing that data and can handle it in code. The only problem (for them) comes in tracking one person across multiple sites since the "simple HTML with no markers screaming 'I am an advert'" ads wouldn't be able to share cookies.

And if it isn't tagged up in a uniquely identifiable way? Like it's just a div in a div in a div in a div called left-nav? You're not going to get a rule to catch that without wiping out chunks of useful content on other websites.

I quite like the idea that you could use ads that you pay for (that don't cost much) to advertise your party or to post silly messages to your friends. Of course the privacy implications of what google needs to know in order to be able to do this are absolutely terrifying, but the idea remains cute.

Additionally, I liked the idea when they turned it on its head, saying that certain individuals can agree to receive adverts of a certain type and you can then pay to have your adverts targeted to those people... such as recruiters.

I wonder the extent to which these ideas are just that : great ideas, but completely impractical in the real world, but this kind of brainstorming is what gives rise to the really good ideas in the end anyway, so its not surprising that they should be having this sort of discussion internally.

I vote "meh". Seems self-evident that
a) Google (if it chose to) could mine a lot more data than it does - e.g. contents of gmail, results of using Google DNS, etc
b) There are ways that Google could make a lot of money out of mining more data from the contents of their servers
c) There is a point where customers would get pissed off/could be illegal if they over stepped the mark
d) That it's entirely reasonable for Google to debate and investigate what further data mining they could do without Being Evil.
I presume the document in TFA is a debate over where they draw the line. I'm glad they're debating it. I'll let you know what I think of them when they've decided where that line is.

Additionally, I liked the idea when they turned it on its head, saying that certain individuals can agree to receive adverts of a certain type and you can then pay to have your adverts targeted to those people... such as recruiters.

Sounds a bit like what Bynamite are doing with their plugin. I've been running it a while (on my works dev machine) to see what it picks up and what advertisers think I'm interested in.

The idea is that I can also use it to feed back a message of "no, I'm not interested in X", sin

...while I abhor some of Google's actions in recent years, they are in a simultaneously fortunate and unfortunate position. They are fortunate in that they have gotten where they are based on their own merits, including their ability to navigate the market with ease and giving people what they want.

They are unfortunate in that they are such a huge business; while customer and user satisfaction is still at the top of their list, nothing will ever be a higher priority than profit (as it should be with a business). This causes them to get sloppy, though...

I'm glad to see they are having at least some form of internal dialogue about just how greedy they should actually be ("greed is good", after all). This indicates that they are at least aware of the recent downturn in the public's perception of them.

I have worked at businesses who wouldn't even think of bothering with these questions. Instead it would look like this: "Would selling the stored info we have on our customers help this FQ's numbers? Yes? Get legal to sign the contract, and the DBA to do an export of the database and E-mail [1] it to the client."

[1]: These are PHBs talking, so they wouldn't understand a 1TB database export can't be E-mailed.

The highest priority of any business should be dealing ethically with everyone. Otherwise, if Profit is their highest principal, then RIAA is performing exactly as they should and we have no reason to scream at them for taking any and everyone to court for piracy.

So Sorry Pojut but we didn't sell you anything but the sizzle. There wasn't any product nor will there ever be any product (vaporware/duke nukem forever) is the results of that kind of thinking. It also results in dangerous products such as the For

Yes true. Profit should be the highest priority for business. Don't mistake profit for bad business practices...most companies would likely make even more money if they treated their customers right and listened to their concerns.

Again, you don't have to be an asshole to make good money...despite the common stigma.

Profit at the expense of quality. 99% of all corperations dont care about anything but next quarter. if I can piss off 30% of my customers but increase profits for next quarter then I am a freaking hero.

I'd say that long term viability should be the highest priority for business. Profit helps with that, but it's not the be-all end-all. You can fire all your employees and make a really good bottom line at the end of the year, but you'll be broke the next. The people that care about such things like privacy and security are also the professionals that judge internet companies like Google. Those people are also Google's employee base. So I'd imagine that not being evil is really vital to Google. I'd say they

1: You can have a business that has a reliable, established name that makes profits year after year where it looks ahead years ahead to see what may be the biggest thing, and does R&D to capitalize on it, funneling profits back into R&D to be able to keep ahead of the curve and maybe even developing a new product line that might be profitable, similar to how IBM went from cash registers to computers.

One of the first lessons I learned in business went something like this...

Boss: The customer is always right

Me: Even when they are wrong?

Boss: Even when they are wrong.

Me: How can that be?

Boss: It just is. You make the customer believe they are alright, and business will take care of itself.

A few weeks later, I was in front of a customer, who was OBVIOUSLY not getting what he wanted, and I was trying my hardest to accommodate the customer, my boss steps in, and asks the guy what he wanted, the guy said "Fi

I have seen this from time to time, a statement "companies are required to maximize profit", but I cannot find any specific law that spells out how 'maximize' is measured. I looked into wiki and found this reference [wikipedia.org], but nothing stated measureable requirements. In fact, the only "requirement" is that they make a profit, how ever that profit is measured.

I may be quite comfortable making 6% profit while someone else may choose 10% profit. The rationalization that corporations have to "maximize" by law is a

As I said to another poster who responded to me, people seem to always associate "concentrate on profit" with "being a dick"...the two are not mutually exclusive. In fact, the more you focus on customers, the more your profit will increase (in theory, at least).

Making as much money as possible isn't inherently bad...it's all in how you go about it.

As I said to another poster who responded to me, people seem to always associate "concentrate on profit" with "being a dick"...the two are not mutually exclusive. In fact, the more you focus on customers, the more your profit will increase (in theory, at least).

Making as much money as possible isn't inherently bad...it's all in how you go about it.

I agree that making money is not inherently bad. After all, capitalism is supposed to be about bringing together buyers and sellers and having both walk away better for the transaction. If the seller can make a good profit from satisfying the customer, I think that's great. But concentrating on the profit can easily lead one to be a dick. There is no shortage of examples of businesses acting irresponsibly (to put it mildly) in the pursuit of profit. They exploit labor, externalize costs, hide malfeasan

people seem to always associate "concentrate on profit" with "being a dick"...the two are not mutually exclusive.

Making as much money as possible isn't inherently bad...it's all in how you go about it.

That is very true, but if "making profit" is a higher priority than "not being a dick", then they will be a dick if it increases profit. It's not that being a dick is required for profit, but if you are willing to do so you will get more.

In almost all situations, being just a little bit of a dick is far more profitable than not being.

The real question is how much of "being a dick" does it take before profit starts to decrease due to customer dissatisfaction? If making a profit is the top priority (which it

There's a sensible point hiding under the hyperbole about slavery though; sometimes a company can turn a better profit by doing something unethical, so commitment purely to the bottom line will fail to produce businesses that do good things.

Doing something unethical (of the type that your customers care about) then getting publicly busted for it... that's where ethical behaviour is a more attractive option for the profit-chaser. But too often companies are able to slide along despite unethical practice by being so big (and the bad stuff so remote) that people just buy from them out of habit, without giving a lot of thought to exactly what they might be supporting.

The link I posted shows Mutual funds holding 81% (more than enough to do anything they please) , Brin has only 79,000 shares and I don't even see Page on the list. In other words, if came down to a vote of share, the founders have no voting power.

As mentioned above, the class B shares Brin and Page and the other founders and execs hold are worth 10 votes each. I personally can't vouch for the truth of that, but if true it would explain how they can control with such a small proportion of shares.

Google's hesitancy to move into places where DoubleClick once trod with near impunity. I don't mind Internet ads on websites. What I hate are the scummy, one-flat-stomach rule, teeth whitening, acai berry, and other similar ads that show up on almost every website, major and minor. This says nothing of the older types of annoying ads, like audio, flashing banners and pop-ups. I don't even like seeing the graphics of these sorts of ads because they're so visually displeasing. These sorts of ads are why I use Ad-Block, not because I am opposed to all advertising. Cookies had a reputation similar to these ads, and that's why Google was so hesitant.

Now I'm not a big fan of ads myself, but I do wonder sometimes what would happen if google did actually deliver content relevant ads to the web pages I regularly visit, or based off interests I had in my facebook/google buzz or similar online profile. Then I wouldn't be delivered the one-flat-stomach rule, teeth whitening ads, but more likely WoW, PS3, Archery, movies etc ads that I might actually be interested in.

I'm not saying that I'll suddenly start clicking on every ad I see as it would appear to be in

You know, for a short time I ran ads on a feline-related site I am responsible for and kept waiting for the ads to be relevant to the content of the site. Three months in, they still were not relevant. So, I dumped all the ads and just kept the Google searchbox. If they can't even make the ads relevant to the content of the site, then why should I subject my visitors to the ads and why should I muck up the look of the site by displaying ads?

Now I'm not a big fan of ads myself, but I do wonder sometimes what would happen if google did actually deliver content relevant ads to the web pages I regularly visit, or based off interests I had in my facebook/google buzz or similar online profile.

My facebook is full of college girls, and Facebook for like 2 months constantly delivered every other ad as "DATE A COUGAR!" I'm also single (I have NEVER had a girlfriend, EVER) and disinterested in relationships entirely; Facebook loves to show me expensive, multiple-diamond-encrusted engagement rings. Now seriously, I'm not LOOKING for the perfect girl, I'm AVOIDING it; if I met a girl I wanted to marry, she'd be something so special I'd get her a white gold engagement ring with a single beautifully set diamond, and some simple but beautifully carved wedding bands in white gold. Who buys a girl an ugly, gaudy, heart-shaped ring with 47 diamonds just crammed in there in the ugliest manner possible?!

Better to jump than be pushed. Maybe it's time for Google to consider splitting into 2 companies: all the search stuff in one and all the other (FB, docs etc.) in the second. That way they get to control their own destiny rather than have outside interests decide it for them.

The search arm makes makes 99% (not an exaggeration) of Google's revenue through ads, and is effectively keeping every other Google product on life support. You can't break them up or the other projects will die.

the marketing assholes in the board room, but if google sticks by its loyalty to privacy, they will remain a respected and profitable company for a very long time

if however they break their commitments to privacy, they will, indeed, reap a flurry of greater profits. but at the cost of driving away customers. the problem in a business like google's is there is always another search website, and even if its not quite as fast or accurate as google, if it makes a loud point of pledging to not rape your privacy, then it will even beat google, eventually

before there was google, there was altavista. before facebook, myspace. the king of the web does not have to stay the king of the web, and it can be quite sudden and amazing at how sudden and fast that fall can be. google better remember this

Just to be clear, Google's customers are the advertisers. We the users are their products.But yes, if their products evaporate it will be a might challenge to sell anything to their customers and the nickle-and-dime folks at Google will feel that.

A couple years ago, I had the idea for de-google. Don't like the results that come up when your name is searched?? For a fee, those results can be modified to hide embarrassing things (or whatever else). I thought it was a good idea, I'm still waiting to see it applied.

It can be applied easily. Just make some script that posts random stuff with your name in it to thousands of forums. Then, when people search for your name, there will be so much noise that the results are useless. Noise is google's enemy.

Hello, my name is [competing product to the company I represent] and I dont like the results that come up when people search for my name. You say that you can change the results for a small fee. Where do we...I mean I... send the check?

... the Guild of Calamitous Intent was formed. When part of Col. Lloyd Venture's league decided THEY knew better what was best for the world and should profit from the power of the ancient orb themselves.

Never in the history of American business has a company as large and powerful as Google NOT taken advantage of something this profitable and desired by those in control of the country.

I don't care what they say, or how many slogans they have that they sometimes follow and sometimes ignore - they're going to use this data. The only question is to wha extent - and given Eric Schmidt's recent statements on privacy and the future of the web (which were completely disgusting to me and likely to anyone else who values the internet as a place of freedom and growth), I expect that they will fully exploit all that they have.

I am not anti-Google, I love Google's products and I think their search engine is the best, and as far as large companies go they certainly aren't anywhere near the most evil - but the power and data they have, along with some of the places they've received funding from, combined with the attitude of their CEO is greatly concerning.

Google, as a publicly traded company, only has one obligation: To make a profit for shareholders
Few companies set out to do bad deeds but most won't rule them out. Google was supposed to be different. Regarding "Don't be evil"(tm), CEO Eric Schmidt recently clarified the policy saying that it was simply meant as a conversation starter.

Here's Google from good to bad...+7.1 - Philanthropy
Creating a foundation to fight poverty. +5.3 - Coddling staff
Establishing on-site day care as an emplo

I think we have a misunderstanding. I'm not saying that by complying with the law they company is inherently not evil. I'm saying that you can't call a company evil for doing something they are legally required to.

Again, with the exception of Nazi Germany where you HAD to sell out people who were in one of the groups slated for death I can't think of many laws make you evil by sheer compliance with them.

If the government's law officials request or order Google to hand over information, that's not evide

Interest Targeting: http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/media/info-GOOGLEDOCS1008-text2.png [wsj.com] This section pertains to Google's plans to sell ads targeted to users' interests across the Google Content Network (GCN) -- the more than one million websites on which it sells display ads. It argues that Google can better identify users' likely interests than competitors through sophisticated analysis and richer data.

Retargeting: http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/media/info-GOOGLEDOCS1008-retarg.png [wsj.com] Document discusses targeting ads at users who have already visited a particular website, known as retargeting. It notes that smaller ad companies have referred to such technologies as the "holy grail" of behavioral targeting, known here as "BT," but have struggled because they don't see users across enough sites. Google has since launched the feature across its display ad network.

"Wacky" Ideas: http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/media/info-GOOGLEDOCS1008-text8.png [wsj.com] Once Google had the technology to be able to target ads to individual web browsers, it contemplated a range of ideas, including letting individuals pay not to see ads, block individual advertisers or share data about themselves in exchange for a discount on their Internet service bill. At least one idea, the Larry Page ad, was never pursued.

Advertising Exchange: http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/media/info-GOOGLEDOCS1008-text9.png [wsj.com] Google planned to limit use such data about what websites people visited for targeting on sites where it sold ads, known as the Google Content Network, or GCN. Over time, allowing other ad buyers and sellers to use its data to identify people to target could boost business.

In 2009, Google earned about $0.1016 per visitor. So pay them about $37 a year and never see an ad.

There. Next question?

Anyways, the math:

620 million visitors per day.

23 billion yearly revenue.

$37.0968/visitor..1016/day/visitor.

Actually, subscription search services are sounding like they are practical. This adds $3.09/month to your Internet bill. Add in obscene escalators for ludicrous groth in revenue, and this isn't much worse than your current ISP's rate increases, certainly not as bad as the TV bill.

Wow. And we could let the advertisers torture those too cheap to pay. Nice.

In my opinion, the problem is Eric Schmidt. I trust both Larry Page and (even more so) Sergey Brin that they really try to live by "don't be evil".
But Eric Schmidt transforms the company more and more into a profit-oriented, shareholder-controlled, greedy mess.
I'm afraid that it will get a lot worse once Page and Brin lose give up control over the company.
After all, most shareholders are concerned with return of investment, not things as silly as ethics.
"By 2014, Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin will have sold enough of their stock to give up majority control of the company, Google announced Friday evening."
http://news.cnet.com/8301-30684_3-10440005-265.html [cnet.com]
Not something I'm looking forward to.

I don't have a problem with product placement; seeing Walt Kowalski drinking PBR and Heinekin instead of some made-up brand adds realism to the movie. But they didn't use to have commercials in the theater. They would have trailers for upcoming shows, but no ads for Coke or Toyota.

As to cable, cable channels didn't have commercials back in the day. Nor were the movies censored. Nor did thay have those goddamned annoying logos at the bottom right of the screen.